KPMG Australia taps Lenovo for device services

Lenovo has struck a three-year device-as-a-service (DaaS) deal with KPMG Australia, involving more than 7,800 devices.

The move is part of KPMG's multi-vendor ‘rationalisation’ strategy to a single source supplier for hardware, services, and finance.

Lenovo DaaS is a fully-managed, flexible subscription model combining hardware, services and finance into a single managed services contract.

Furthermore, it involves procurement, configuration, deployment and asset recovery across all KPMG corporate IT devices, along with security and compliance management including asset management, patching, antivirus, encryption and privilege management.

KPMG CIO Craig Wishart said the new arrangement includes all the services it requires under a monthly fee, enabling the flexible use of devices.

“KPMG Australia on-boards a high volume of interns on short-term contracts each year. This spikes demand for devices at certain periods, meaning they are only effectively used for nine months within their three-year life,” Wishart said.

“The new service will enable flexible use of these devices, allowing them to be 'parked' and not billed, until they are required again, greatly improving the fleet utilisation to cost ratio. This allows a ‘predictability’ of the monthly IT spend and better alignment of cost with user productivity.”

A low-risk transition project management proposal was implemented to ensure minimal disruption to KPMG’s business. According to Lenovo, at one point, it managed to deploy more than 1,000 units in a week, fully profiled and ready for use.

Lenovo A/NZ managing director Matt Codrington said the fully managed subscription-based service offers the commercial flexibility for KPMG Australia to flex DaaS assets up or down, without incurring a penalty or re-pricing.

“The utility commercial model also allows KPMG Australia to adjust the fleet size during the term, enabling them to easily adapt to changing business environment,” Codrington said.

“We have a long standing track record of delivering large scale managed deployment projects at KPMG Australia and look forward to continuing our relationship.”